Can anyone confirm that Worcester Shrub Hill's Up Section signal is to be renewed as a CLS? I though that I saw that a new AWS inductor had been installed on the approach to the existing LQ (motor-operated) semaphore (SH13) as I passed by earlier this week and spot renewal of mechanical signals as CLs seems to be a current trend in this area.

Voie libre wrote:Can anyone confirm that Worcester Shrub Hill's Up Section signal is to be renewed as a CLS? I though that I saw that a new AWS inductor had been installed on the approach to the existing LQ (motor-operated) semaphore (SH13) as I passed by earlier this week and spot renewal of mechanical signals as CLs seems to be a current trend in this area.

John Hinson wrote:...What and where is the overlap? I see nothing wrong with the arrangement if the signal is being worked like an IB in rear but even allowing for the foreshortening in Adrian's video there doesn't seem to be adequate distance between the DMU and the HST that is waiting to depart in the other direction.

The most recent plan I have is 1974 but is shows the Down Inner Home as a mere 145 yards from the box and the Down Platform to Up Main Starter as 60 yards. That's 205 yards and certainly not enough under the regulations at that date to permit the move shown in the video unless special instructuions were in place.

So put the clock back to when Wylds Lane box was there. Unless local instructions said otherwise, Shrub Hill Station would not accept a train from Wylds Lane unless there was 440 yards beyond the (now Inner) Home signal. It is only 323 yards from the Home to the big disc signal(s) half way down the station.

That's not the whole story, though, because permissive/station yard working was always allowed at SH, so at worst he would have been allowed to accept trains from Wylds Lane under Reg 5 in those circumstances.

When they resignalled it in 1973, it was clearly decided, for whatever reasons, that drawing trains up to SH82 would be allowed provided the line was clear to the beginning of the platform (ie where SH10 is) and the intervening points all normal.

...Are you sure 84 signal shows double yellow? It certainly didn't in 1974 - I have two plans showing it as a two-aspect distant (it was once Wylds Lane's distant). So when or why did it change?

I'm 99.99% sure it was changed from Y/G to Y/YY when Wylds Lane Jn was abolished in 1973.

Finally got to visit SH and TJ boxes this afternoon, on an organised SRS visit. Here are one or two interesting details about the SH2/TJ6 replacement (with an LED signal an overlap's distance in rear of the junction) that was made earlier this year:

This arrangement in effect now gives SH 'free acceptance' for trains from TJ, and as a consequence SH no longer has an acceptance lever for up trains on the Up and Down Main. (TJ of course still has an acceptance lever for down trains via this line, so it is now worked analogously to the Norton Jn-Evesham and Droitwich-Stoke Works sections, with only one box having an acceptance lever.)

Tunnel Jn has a slot on this signal [TJ6] which is plated 'Slot for Shrub Hill 2/3'.

If SH7 (up main inner home - centre-pivoted signal at London end of P2) has also been cleared, then SH2 will clear immediately (to a Y aspect); otherwise, it is approach-controlled.

Neither the TJ5 nor TJ6 levers have white bands, though the former, obviously, is locked by the track circuits.

The mooted plan to replace TJ's semaphore junction signal (TJ5/7/22) with a LED has not taken place, and I was told is no longer included in any short/medium-term plans - hooray!